The newest test build of Microsoft’s Windows 10 ‘Redstone 5’ includes a bunch of new features, especially for Notepad.

Credit: Microsoft

(As many readers here know, I live in Notepad, so I am noting these with a mix of excitement and trepidation, given Notepad’s simplicity is what keeps me coming back.)

But before gettting to all the Notepadness, it’s worth noting that Microsoft has, as of Build 17713, released July 11, now forked Redstone 5 into its own branch, in preparation for the next Windows 10 feature release. For now, those who opted into the “Skip Ahead” ring are being put back into the “Fast Ring,” with the “Skip Ahead” option temporarily disappearing from Settings. Microsoft will be re-opening Skip Ahead “in the coming weeks,” and will require those who want to opt in to do so again.

In today’s Windows 10 test build, Microsoft is adding new options to the find/replace feature in Notepad. There’s a new option to do wrap-around find/replace to the find dialog, and Notepad also will remember previously entered values and the state of checkboxes so as to automatically populate them next time users open the “Find” dialog.”

There’s also an option allowing quick text zooming (under View >Zoom). The current zoom level will be displayed in the status bar. Notepad also is getting the ability to display line and column numbers when word-wrap is enabled.

Other new Notepad additions with this build, according to Microsoft:

Improved performance when opening large files in Notepad

Support for Ctrl + Backspace for deleting the previous word

Arrow keys now correctly unselect text first before moving the cursor

When saving a file in Notepad, the line and column number no longer reset to 1

There are a number of other new features in today’s build, including support for biometrics (Windows Hello for Business) for Azure Active Directory and Active Directory users who want to authenticate to a remote desktop session.

There’s also a new “Web Sign-In” feature that enables Windows logon support for non-ADFS federated providers, such as SAML. (Web Sign-in only works on Azure Active Directory-joined PCs.) A new “Fast Sign-in” option is designed to enable those with shared or guest Windows 10 PCs to sign in more quickly.

Windows Defender Application Guard (WDAG) has an updated user interface inside of the Windows Security section as of this release. Standalone users can install and configure their WDAG settings without needing to change Registry Key settings, among other features.

Microsoft is refining the settings in Edge to allow users to control autoplay permissions on a per-site basis. With this build, Microsoft also has added a new dictionary function to allow users to look up definitions for key words inside a page or document. And there are new toolbar options in the PDF Reader in Edge as of Build 17713.

A full list of features, fixes and known issues is included in today’s blog post.

Windows 10 Redstone 5, also likely to be known as 1809, is expected to start rolling out to mainstream users around October 2018.